The
major contribution of Ferdinand de
Saussure to linguistics can be summed up as providing the basic groundwork
of fundamental concepts; his definition of the ‘linguistic sign’; his
explanation of the distinction between concrete and abstract linguistic units;
distinction between descriptive (synchronic) and historical (diachronic), study
of language, and so on. He was under the influence of the new scientific
temperament and followed the principles of Durkheim who said that
‘we have social facts that can be studied
scientifically when we consider them from an aspect that is independent of
their individual manifestations’.
This
attitude helped the shaping of the structuralist approach.
De
Saussure put forward the concepts of La langue, La Parole and Le Language. He concentrates
on two of them.
By langue, he meant ‘the language system’ and
By Parole he meant the ‘act of speaking’.
By Language he meant ‘human speech as a whole’.
This
human speech or language is composes of Langue and Parole. La Language does not have exact equivalent in English. It embraces
the faculty of language in all its various form and manifestations. La language
is the faculty of human speech present in all normal hum being due to heredity
but which requires the correct environmental stimulus or stimuli for proper
development. It is our faculty to talk to each other. It is many side and
heterogeneous. It can be taken as whole. Because it covers several areas
simultaneously that is physical, physiological and psychology. It belongs to
the individual and to the society. We can not put it into ant category of human
traits because we can not discover its unit yet it is a universal behavior trait
more of interest of the anthropologist or biologist than to the linguist who
commences his study with Langue and Parole. Language is for us Le Langue.
According
to Saussure is the totality of Langue
deducible form an examination of memories of all language users. It is the
store house, the some total of word imagine in the minds of individuals. It is
not to be confused with human speech of which it is only a definite part
although certainly an essential one. It is both a social product of the faculty
of speech of and a collection of necessary convention that have been adopted by
a social body to permit individuals to exercise that faculty. Language is the
lexical, grammatical and phonological constitution of a language. It is the
collective fact of a language. It is a corporate social phenomenal. It is
homogenous, it is concrete. We can study it scientifically. It is grammar plus
vocabulary plus pronunciation system of a community.
La
langue is a collective pattern which exists as ‘a sum of impressions deposited
in the brain of each individual.., like a dictionary of which identical copies
have been distributed to each individual... it exists in each individual, yet
it is common to all’. La langue is a repository of signs which each speaker has
received from the other speakers of the community. It is passive. It is a set
of conventions received by us all, ready-made from the community.
Ultimately
Langue to has to related Parole
which is the actual uses of individuals which a community manifest itself in
everyday speech that the actual concrete act of speaking on the part of and
individual the controlled or construable psychophysical activity. Parole is the
set of all utterances that have actually been produced. Parole is a personal, dynamic, social activity which
exists at a particular time and place speech. Parole is something personal and
the only object available for direct observation to the linguist. It is
constant and generalized observation of the linguist. It is constant and
generalized an ordinary speaker can neither create it not modify it. A German
scholar Ulimall has tabulated the main difference between language and Parole
in following manner.
La Parole : By contrast la
parole is active and denotes the actual speech act of the individual. We can
better understand it by considering each act of speaking as a unique event. It
is unique because it reflects the unstable, changeable relationship between the
language, the precise contextual elements triggering particular utterances, and
personal factors. Thus each particular speech act is characterised by the
personality, nature and several other external forces governing both the
production and reception of a speech act. There is a great deal that is
particular, individual, personal and idiosyncratic about la parole as opposed
to la langue which emphasizes speech as the common act of behaviour, ‘given
that there is a good deal that is idiosyncratic or not fully institutionalised,
parole cannot be stable and systematic’ (Wilkins : 34). Parole gives the data
from which statements about langue are made; parole is not collective but
individual, momentary and heterogenous.
As Francis P. Dinneen points
out “when we hear la parole of another community, we perceive the noises made,
but not the social fact of language. We cannot connect the sounds produced and
the social facts with which the other speech associates the sounds. When we
hear la parole within our own community we perceive the sounds as associated
with social facts, according to a set of rules. These rules, which can be
called the convention, or grammar, of the language are habits that education
has imposed on us. They have the property of being general throughout the
community. That is why all the speakers can understand each other.
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Langue (Language)
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Parole (Speech)
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1. It is stable and institutionalised.
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It is mobile and personal.
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2. It is passive.
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It is active.
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3.It is a social fact and general for the community.
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It is individual and idiosyncratic.
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4.It contains the negative limits on what a speaker must say.
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It doesnot put any such limits.
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5. It is sum of properties shared by all speakers of a
community.
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It contains infinite number of
individual properties.
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6. A scientific study can only be based on La langue
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It is not amenable to scientific
study.
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7. It is an abstraction.
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It is concrete manifestation
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8. It is a collective instrument.
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It is not a collective instrument.
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9. It is a set of conventions and habits handed down to
next generation readymade.
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It is diverse and variegated.
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10. It is language as a speaker is expected to use.
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It is language in actual use.
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11. It is not subject to social and individual pressure.
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It is susceptible to social and
other pressure.
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12. It is fixed.
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It is free.
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13. It is a potential form of language.
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It is an actualised form of
language
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